i 3 2 CHARLES J. BULLOCK 



is increased by a comparison of the methods and costs of 

 production in the various plants. The first of these advan- 

 tages may be open to question, since it is not clear that large 

 independent concerns do not afford sufficient room for spe- 

 cialization of talent; while it may be denied that, in the long 

 run, any possible gain from this source will suffice to counter- 

 balance the apathy begotten by monopoly. Concerning the 

 second it may be remarked that, at the outset, this gain would 

 accrue only to the least efficient plants, and would not make 

 the combination superior to the best of the original estab- 

 lishments ; while, after a time, although all the factories might 

 be brought up to the same level, the lack of competition would 

 retard the rate of future improvement. 



When it is contended that the " strength of the trust is 

 that it gives the opportunity for the exercise of these high- 

 est qualities of industrial leadership,'' and that it gives us 

 "a process of natural selection of the very highest order," 

 we may question whether stock speculation and other causes 

 lying outside the sphere of mere productive efficiency have 

 not had more to do with the formation of recent combina- 

 tions than demonstrated superiority in business management. 

 And, even if it be admitted that dominating powers of leader- 

 ship have played their part in the movement, it may be 

 asserted that the establishment of permanent monopoly 

 will interfere seriously with the future process of selection. 

 Professor Lindsay has remarked very justly that the " de- 

 velopment of a high order of undertaking genius in the few 

 seems .... to depend upon a wide range of undertaking 

 experience in the many," and that under a regime of trusts 

 "we would in the course of a few generations have very 

 little available material from which to make selections." 

 It must be remembered that the able leaders now at the 

 head of the successful trusts were developed out of a field 

 which afforded the widest opportunity for creative ability 

 and independent initiative. These are the supreme qualities 

 requisite for great industrial leadership; and they are not 

 likely to be fostered by a regime which, if the believers in 

 monopoly are to be taken at their word, closes each impor- 

 tant branch of manufactures to new enterprises, and renders 



